Slavery, Male Violence Against Women and Revolution in Robert Wedderburn's The Axe Laid to the Root (1817)

This Zine article in Revolutions in Print examines Robert Wedderburn's six issues of The Axe Laid to the Root, or a Fatal Blow to Oppressors, which was published by the author in London in 1817. In these rare pamphlets, he writes against slavery, male violence toward women, and advocates for governments to contain equal numbers of men and women. Many writers have written against slavery; even more sponsor revolutionary politics. However, there are two areas Robert (I use the first name to distinguish from his slaver-rapist father) writes on that are ground-breaking: male rage against women; and publishing in Jamaican Creole. An early champion of this in print, Robert Wedderburn predates more popular examples by a century in his incendiary Axe Laid to the Root.